A woman convicted of murdering her husband claimed he would forgive her as she was released from prison this week.
Elize Matsunaga became the subject of the Netflix documentary Elize Matsunaga: Once Upon a Crime after she shot and killed her husband, Marcos Matsunaga, in 2012.
Marcos's remains were later discovered in plastic bags scattered along a roadside 20 miles from his and his wife's home in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and Matsunaga alleged at the time that she had shot Marcos in self-defence.
She claimed Marcos had shouted and slapped her when he found out she had hired a private detective, who discovered Marcos was having affairs and filmed him with an escort, though the Netflix documentary casts doubt on her claim by featuring interview with people familiar with the case.
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The couple had 34 guns in the residence, and interviewees suggested Matsunaga was worried about losing her life of luxury if Marcos left her, prompting her to shoot him out of spite.
CCTV footage showed Marcos entering the apartment with the pizza, but never leaving again. Cameras also caught Matsunaga hauling multiple suitcases into the elevator and down the stairs, but returning empty-handed.
Matsunaga was found guilty of acting in self-defence and was initially sentenced to 19 years and 11 months in prison.
In 2019, Brazil's Superior Court of Justice reduced the sentence to 16 years and three months, but on Monday (30 May) she was released on parole from Santa Maria Eufrasia Pelletier Women's Penitentiary in Tremembe in south-eastern Brazil.
Upon her release, Matsunaga claimed Marcos would have forgiven her for the murder, saying: "I believe in spirituality and I believe that he has already forgiven me and I pray for him in my prayers."
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"I'm really, really happy to have overcome this step, I know we will have others, now is a new step," she continued, adding: "But I'm very happy to have won, for the people who supported me, for the people who understood. Unfortunately I can't fix what happened, what I committed, [but] I'm getting a second chance."
The author and former escort will now serve the rest of her sentence back in public, while having to periodically report her occupation and address to the authorities.
While in prison, she wrote her autobiography Picnic in Hell in which she asks for forgiveness from her daughter, who lives with her late father's relatives and who Matsunaga has not seen in a decade.
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Topics: World News, Netflix, True crime, Crime